


what are you doing new year's eve?

by belgard



Category: Bohemian Rhapsody (Movie 2018), Queen (Band)
Genre: 1970's, Dancing, Flirting, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Making Out, Mutual Pining, New Year's Eve, Party, Pining, Pre-Relationship, deaky is an angel, disco deaky !!!, implied freddie/brian, italics for flashbacks, john's platform boots making an appearance, just because, oh hey!, roger thinks so too believe me, somehow freddie plays scrabble @ a party, there's a scene that involves alcohol
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-19
Updated: 2019-01-19
Packaged: 2019-10-12 07:19:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17463092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/belgard/pseuds/belgard
Summary: when they decided to spend the new year's eve at a party in a massive mansion that belongs to freddie's friend, john finds himself feeling lonely, and it seems like the more inebriated he is, the more he thinks about a certain blond drummer than has found a place in his heart for a long time.





	what are you doing new year's eve?

**Author's Note:**

> hi everyone! here's a piece that i've been working on! i hope you'll like it lots! anyway there's a scene which involves (implied) heavy alcohol consumption, so if that is a trigger for you, it starts at a flashback episode where it goes _“Roger?” John knocks on the door..._
> 
> i hope you'll love it! please leave a comment and kudos!

 

  

This is definitely more of Freddie and Roger’s forte, a corner of John’s mind supplies.

 

In the midst of all party-goers and vibrant colours he stands against the counter of the bar, leaning his weight against it as he swirls the slowly-melting ice in his pool of gin and tonic. The glass looks pretty, unabashedly dainty in this scenario. He feels just fine, but he _does_ feel the foot of a girl who’s sitting next to him, rubbing it lightly against his calf in an odd attempt of flirtation just a bit disturbing.

 

He doesn’t know whose idea was it to celebrate New Year’s Eve in someone’s house party.

 

His fight or flight instinct comes to life – even if he isn’t in particular danger at all, mind you – but he doesn’t know what to choose when he doesn’t know where he going to go, nor does he know what he _should_ do to make the girl’s foot stop rubbing itself against his leg. It’s ticklish, and it’s creepy. He’s sorry that he thinks like that about her, who he is sure is very harmless, but it’s just far out of his orbit and he doesn’t feel comfort in it at all.

 

His friends, _god_ knows where they are. Freddie is probably in the dance floor at the other room of this massive mansion – which John forgets belongs to whom, but he’s sure it’s a celebrity friend of Freddie’s – just  swinging his hips with some bird or some bloke. Brian is probably chatting with some preppy classmate about quantum physics in the middle of a house party. And Roger… well, the highest possibility for Roger is that he’s off in one of the many bedrooms inside this house, entertaining someone with his impeccable charms while another conquest waits for him on the couch.

 

He wants to laugh. It hasn’t been that long, since he first joined the band, but it’s still strange that he already has his own predictions about these three strangers that he hadn’t even met or spoke to before the audition. They’re _absolutely_ welcoming, and John wishes this could eventually blossom into something that brings John great comfort. He has never had friends like them before, who are so bold and so flamboyant and just… everything that he’s not.

 

But in all honestly, perhaps this might be one of the things that will make John a whole different kind of person in the future. More open, more outspoken, more honest with himself. He adores them either way, even when they’ve left him alone. In the middle of some room he doesn’t know shite about. With a girl pressed up against his side.

 

Just when he’s thinking about her, she leans closer to whisper in his ear. John tenses up quicker than he avoids spending time alone with Roger in the studio.

 

“Hi, you,” she says. She clearly sounds pissed, and by the way her half-lidded eyes look when she’s staring at him, he isn’t even sure if she’s aware of her surroundings. “You’re pretty.”

 

John nods, just to be polite. “Hello,” he says, cursing inwardly when his voice shakes. “And thank you?”

 

God, why does he have to be awkward with _everyone_? Yes, he’s openly bisexual but with this attitude, he’s afraid he wouldn’t win anyone’s heart, male _or_ female, or even everything in between.

 

“Aren’t you in…in that band?” she slurs out, her movements far too languid. Thankfully, her foot has stopped rubbing against John’s calf. He’s relieved for that.

 

“Queen?” he supplies for her, raising his eyebrows in the hopes that perhaps their band _has_ grown as big as they think it has.

 

She then breaks out with a grin, but her eyes are still a flurry. “That’s it!” she says, her gaze dropping briefly over John’s figure, as if she’s scanning him up and down. John squirms a bit on his feet, unsure of what to do. “ _Queen_.” She adds: “That band of yours, fantastic. ‘A love it.”

 

John smiles at her, tight-lipped and stiff. God, he just wants the earth to swallow him whole. “Ta,” he says. “I really appreciate that.” Once again, he swirls his glass in the hopes of the ice swirling along to his movements, but when he looks down, the glass is devoid of any ice whatsoever. He can’t help but frown.

 

“What’s your name?” she asks, cocking her head to the side as she grabs her glass to down her whiskey in a mere second. John raises his eyebrows at this, a bit impressed. But he worries for her safety, just a little bit. He hopes she came here with a friend that can take her home.

 

Just for the shits and giggles, he replies with “Roger Taylor.”

 

The girl stares at him deeply for a second, before she snorts and shakes her head, turning to signal the bartender for another one. John only looks at her in return.

 

“What’s wrong?” he asks.

 

“ _Everyone_ knows Roger Taylor, sweetheart,” she mumbles. Another glass of whiskey on the rocks appear on the counter in front of her. “Blond, blue eyes, and foxy.” She trails her gaze back at him, making him gulp. “Who is _clearly_ not you.”

 

He winces. “Ouch.”

 

“You’re still not fooling me,” she says. “Even when I’m _this_ pissed.” She returns to her drink, closing her eyes as she takes a sip.

 

Roger _is_ a popular member among their college scene, and for some reason it always makes his heart ache. Just a bit. It makes him even more aware that he will _never_ have a chance with Roger, who can have anyone he wants in a blink of an eye, because they’re all queueing up for him, waiting patiently. They’re all gorgeous, and they all fell in love with someone who is _so_ beautiful he can make your head spin. Just one look from his azure eyes and then, you’re down on your knees.

 

Whenever the blond comes to the studio late, with rumpled shirt, tousled sandy hair, scarlet cheeks, and wild eyes, it just destroys John. They all know what he did before he came. They all know his habit, and they never give him shite for it because really, it’s none of their business and it makes Roger happy. So why should they mind?

 

Roger never has to think about what other people think of him, and that is a wonderful thing in itself that even John himself envies, but John is just… he wishes Roger would _know._ That he would notice, just once. He wants Roger to notice him; to notice that he fancies him. He wants Roger to be able to see it, so that Roger is aware, but John feels like he’d be fine if Roger doesn’t return his feelings, but it’s the reality that hurts.

 

Everytime Roger does something _small_ , like leaving a lingering glance at John as if he doesn’t know that Roger is looking. John thinks of it as something that Roger does habitually, but a corner of his mind always tries to mend it and spin it into some kind of scenario that only appears in his fantasies. Or whenever Roger touches his knee when they’re talking next to each other, or when Roger places his hand on John’s thigh and subconsciously draw little circles with his fingers on top of John’s clothed skin. It all sends John’s mind into overdrive, but he knows he’s just fantasising about things that wouldn’t happen, and that he’s only turning friendly interactions into something… more.

 

Just thinking about it makes his cheeks heat up. _Oh, good god_.

 

He knows that Roger has a way to express his affection, and it’s from touch. Brian knows that, and Fred knows that. John knows that too, and sometimes he feels horrible for thinking that Roger does those things specially for _him,_ and him only, when it actually isn’t. Roger probably had done more things in the field of _touch_ that he would never do to John or the rest of the band, that he’d do to his lovers. Just thinking about it makes him want to order glass.

 

“What are you thinking about, pretty?” the girl suddenly asks him, taking him away from his train of thoughts. Silently, he thanks her for it. When he looks up, he tries to take in how the girl he’s been talking to actually looks like.

 

She has a strawberry-blonde coloured hair, and her skin is really pale to the point it looks a bit like she’s sickly, if it wasn’t for the reddish shade of lipstick she’s wearing on her lips. It makes her look more… alive, even beneath the dim purple lighting of the room. He notices that a part of her lipstick has been smudged a little. She’s wearing a white mini dress with bold black stripes on it, and he recognises this kind of dress from the early 1960’s. What do they call them— _shift_ dresses? He isn’t sure but they were really unique to him at the time.

 

Her eyes are actually blue, when he focuses on them. When his eyes first met hers they were far too cloudy to be visible. Her cheeks are flushed scarlet, and her shoulder-length hair that’s flicking up at the ends is tousled.

 

She looks like a mess, but she’s pretty.

 

John shakes his head and finishes his drink, before putting the empty glass on the countertop. “It’s nothing,” he replies.

 

She smiles at this, and it’s an odd kind of smile. She leans closer to him and whispers in his ear: “Want me to take your mind off of it?”

 

John tenses up, and his feet immediately reacts, as he takes a step away from her. “N—no, thank you.”

 

He hears his own voice shaking. _What the hell is wrong with him?_ he thinks to himself. This pretty girl is talking to him, and is actually offering something obscene to him, and anyone would seize the chance immediately, but he feels nothing but emptiness inside. She’s inebriated and out of her mind.

 

The girl then leans back and blinks, before she smiles and nods to herself. She returns to her drink and takes another sip, breathing out slowly.

 

John licks his lips. “I’m sorry,” he says.

 

She turns to look at him, before cracking a little lopsided smile at him. “‘s alright, sweetheart,” she slurs. “I get it.”

 

“Thank you,” John says, and she just grins at him behind the lip of the glass. “I’ve never got your name.”

 

She pauses. “It’s Veronica,” she says. “Call me Ronnie.” She suddenly outstretches a hand, and John shakes it.

 

“I’m John,” he says. “John Deacon.”

 

They take their hands away.

 

“John Deacon?” she asks, her eyebrows furrowing. “Feel like I’ve heard that name before.” And then she sets her eyes at him, and widens them comically, startling John a little bit. “Oh! You’re th—the bassist, aren’t you?”

 

He smiles at her. “Precisely.”

 

“Nice to meet you, John,” she says. “I’ve got a great feeling we’ll be best friends.”

 

John laughs at this, a bit surprised at how this encounter with a mod girl in the 1970’s turns out. Veronica, or Ronnie, looks genuine with this invitation, and a corner of John’s mind really does want to be friends with her. Perhaps they’ll meet again outside the party.

 

“Maybe,” John replies with a smile.

 

“So what are you doing here alone?” Ronnie asks, and John instictively lowers her hand when she raises it to signal the bartender who is, fortunately, tending another patron. Ronnie briefly sends him a surprised look, but he only shakes his head. She seems to understand, so she sighs and slumps against her seat.

 

John nods. “Me and the others were planning to celebrate the New Years here,” he replies, shrugging nonchalantly. “Well, my friend Fred was the catalyst, but we all went with him because we thought why not.”

 

“Where…where are they now?” Ronnie asks, resting her head against the palm of her hand, that is propped up on her elbow against the counter. Her eyelids slowly start to drop down every second, like she’s tired, and John really wonders if she came to the party with friends.

 

“Honestly,” John says, “I have no idea.”

 

“Left you?” she asks, and he nods. The bartender taps her shoulder and sends her a gentle smile, which she returns with a dreamy grin, before he mouths at her ‘pay?’ and she fishes out some pounds from her purse, and puts it near her empty glass. The bartender smiles at her, and takes the money and the glass.

 

“Unfortunately,” he replies.

 

“Why don’t you sit down,” she points towards he vacant seat behind him, “it’s been empty for a long time.”

 

John lets out an ‘oh’ sound, embarrassed, befor he turns around and takes a seat on the bar stool, facing Ronnie. She actually looks smaller from where he’s sitting—she’s all slouched and hunched over, her big hair adding only a bit of height to her figure. “Here I am,” he says, bringing his glass up to his lips and taking a small sip. “Sitting.”

 

“Yeah, tha’s great,” she slurs, smiling at him. “Now, tell me about your Queen friends. I wanna know.”

 

“What do you _possibly_ want to know about us?” he asks. “We’re just like any other band around.”

 

“You’re a hit, y’know that right?” Ronnie asks, and when she says this her eyelids are already closed. “ _Everyone_ wants to know about _Queen_.” John raises his hand towards the handsome bartender and mouths at him ‘water?’ before he cocks his head towards Ronnie. He seems to get it, and he nods before getting a tall glass with water in it. He places it on the table, and John smiles at him. The bartender only sends him a nod before he turns towards Ronnie, his gaze lingering on her.

 

John bites down a smile at their one-sided – albeit adorably obvious, on the bartender’s side – interaction, before turning back to Ronnie.

 

He pushes the glass towards her and says, “Have some water, Ronnie.”

 

The girl opens her eyes and blearily looks at the glass as if it’s some foreign object that she has never seen before. She squints her eyes, before she takes the glass and gulps it all down. John can only stare at her, a bit of pity in his heart.

 

“Ta,” she says. “I was really gonna crash.”

 

“You came here with a friend or something?” John asks, and she nods. He breathes out a sigh of relief.

 

“Yeah, she’s… somewhere,” she says, before she raises a hand and points her index finger down towards the crown of her head. “If lost, return to Mary Austin.”

 

“I don’t know who Mary Austin is, but okay.”

 

John places his empty glass on the table.

 

Ronnie waves her hands in front of his face. “You’re changing the subject, tell me about Roger Taylor. Or that little minx Brian something something…name of a month, I don’t care.”

 

John squints her eyes at her. “Brian _May._ ”

 

“Brian May, _whatever_ , John.” She rolls her eyes. “I wanna know if Roger Taylor is as good as they say he is in bed.”

 

John immediately stiffens at this, and he already feels heat engulfing his cheeks. It’s one thing to hear that sentence, but it triggers a part of his mind to _immediately_ think about how Roger would be in bed. He’s never talked to Roger’s lovers – groupies – so he never hears them talking about their experiences. But it’s not like he _wants_ to know. But he has seen them walk out of little rooms backstage, flushed and high off of pleasure. They have this glow to them that makes John’s heart feel like it has been stabbed with a knife, and then that knife is twisted deeper just to spite him.

 

It’s not Roger’s fault, it’s not his abundance of lovers’ faults, it’s not his fault either—it’s nobody’s fault and as vexing as it is, he needs to accept the harsh reality that nobody knows about his attraction to his own bandmate. That’s sad.

 

“Oh?” Ronnie says, perhaps taking note of his reaction. “Why are you so sho—shocked?”

 

“I _don’t_ know how Roger is in…in bed, Ronnie,” he says, feeling his ears growing hot. He really should get himself together. “You should ask him yourself.”

 

(No, she _shouldn’t_! What the fuck is wrong with you?!)

 

“Or his groupies. Take your pick, I guess,” he continues with a shrug, trying to get the feeling of uneasiness off his shoulders. “We never really care about his…um, escapades.”

 

Ronnie raised an eyebrow. “Oh, should I?” she asks, before averting her gaze towards her empty glass. “This water tastes so good. I’ve never had water this tasty.”

 

“You’re just thirsty, Ronnie,” he says, brushing some strands of his hair over one shoulder. He can’t help but to add a little fancy extravaganza-kind of flourish to it just like Freddie, well, the pro’s of having long hair is to be able to swish it as if you’re flaunting yourself, how pretty you are. He flushes a bit after realising what he just did, but can’t help but to feel a tiny – tiny! – bit more confident at the same time.

 

“What about Brian?” Ronnie asks. “I hear he’s secretly a noisy one.”

 

John cringes, and shakes his head to clear his mind before it starts to form images… of Brian… God, that visual just makes him want to turn into a squid and forget about the world.

 

“I don’t _know_ ,” he whines. “You can’t just ask me things like that!”

 

“Fine, tell me about Frank,” she says. Frank? Last time he checked there’s no member in the band called Frank.

 

Suddenly it clicks.

 

“Oh, Freddie?” John asks. She nods.

 

“Fred’s nice.” John shrugs; and it’s true. Freddie has always been very welcoming of him ever since he joined the band. He always asked to dance together with John in the studio when they’re having a break, always encourages him to tell stories about school or gossip about annoying professors and pretentious first-years. Every hug that he shares with Freddie, they all feel genuine. Like the elder _really_ does want to know him better.  “ _Really_ nice.”

 

“Oh yeah?” Ronnie asks, sighing dreamily. At this point John knows that she’s inebriated as ever. “Sounds lovely.”

 

If they weren’t so lovely it wouldn’t be such a problem for John, but unfortunately, they’re some of the greatest people John has ever met. Brian is quiet and kind, but full of snark and he’s ready to glare at anyone  in the room in every argument they’ve ever had. Him and his Red Special—lovers, they are. Brian only sends John tiny, but assuring smiles that surprisingly _work,_ they make John feel comfortable and secure, almost. He’s like the middle ground between Freddie’s ego and Roger’s chaos.

 

If they weren’t so lovely John would just quit, because he can’t take another day with them – with _Roger_ – knowing how much his heart aches for their drummer and having to pretend as if he doesn’t feel anything at all. But he doesn’t want to quit, he doesn’t want to ruin everything that they’ve built, that they’ve had and have now. John adores it too much for it to be gone.

 

“It really is,” John replies with a smile.  

 

“Roger Taylor really is a gorgeous bloke, huh?” Ronnie smiles dreamily at him, her blank eyes squinting at him, as if she’s trying to find something out of John that she’s looking for. John tilts his head, and she smiles. “And something tells me you think so too.”

 

John blinks at her, at loss of words. “Excuse me?”

 

She waves her hand in front of his face, nearly hitting him. “It’s fine, sweetie,” she says, and John can’t say a word. “He’s the talk of the campus these days, y’know? Handsome, charming… Who _doesn’t_ want that?”

 

“Do you?” John asks, scratching the back of his head. “Want, uh, him?”

 

She shrugs nonchalantly, a crooked smile playing at the corner of her lips. “Maybe.”

 

“Fair enough.”

 

 

 ☾

 

 

 

_“How you doin’ over there, Deaks?”_

_John jolts a little on his spot, his heart rate going significantly faster at the sound of his voice. See, he doesn’t even have to look to know who it is. He knows Roger Taylor well enough to recognise him just by the sound of his_ _second-hand_ _boots stepping onto the ground._

_“I’m_ _, uh,” John bites down a smile, refusing to turn and face Roger, “fine.”_

_“You know, if you’ve got any idea popping in that little head of yours you can just tell us, right?” Roger moves to sit right next to him on the ground, and the proximity sends little shivers down his spine. He doesn’t know why he’s reacting this violently over something as simple as being close to the blond, but even the warmth that the elder is radiating is calming enough for him to feel every bit of it. He feels like he’s on a roller coaster, his emotions just going up and down in ways that he didn’t even know possible._

_John nods. “Yeah, I know,” he says, biting on his bottom lip in order to ease himself a little. ‘Self control is key, my dear,’ Freddie would say, and John would really toast to that sentence.  They’ve told him that a million times before about the whole song-writing thing, he doesn’t need to be reminded how every bit of his input matters. He’ll do it when he’s ready.  “I’m in the process of writing something,” he confesses._

_Roger then scoots over to him on the floor, closer, and it startles John to the point he can’t think of anything but the sound of Roger’s legs against the carpet, just reminding John how the elder is moving closer to him second by second. He looks at his bass guitar instead to clear his mind, where he’s plucking mindlessly on the strings, hoping that maybe it’ll calm his heart down a bit. It always does._

_“Oh, you are?” Roger asks, his eyes lighting up when John looks up at him, and it’s such a sight that makes John want to curl up and die. “What’s it called?”_

_John smiles. “It’s called ‘Misfire.’”_

_“Sounds badass,” Roger grins, “can’t wait to hear what it sounds like, Deaks.”_

_John blushes, he can actually feel it in his cheeks. God, he’s embarrassing._

_“I think Freddie’s gonna throw a fit,” John says, and his heart almost skips a beat when he sees Roger’s gaze briefly dropping down to his lips – or maybe he’s just imagining things, he isn’t sure – and then back up to his eyes. Seeing those charming blue eyes up close just sends him reeling._

_And his own atrocious habit of turning every little – ordinarily platonic – actions as something they’re not is just not helping him at all._

_“Why’s that?” Roger asks, furrowing his eyebrows a bit._

_“It’s about,” John flushes, “um, premature ejaculation?”_

_Roger stares at him for a moment, before he breaks out a laugh and shakes his head. John can only look at him, and it sends a small thrill of pride, knowing that he made Roger Taylor laugh. It’s an achievement that someone has to hold dearly with dignity._

_And then Roger leans just a little closer, making John scream internally, because he can’t even keep eye contact, but everything about Roger’s eyes just command him to do it that he just can’t say no. They’re blue, blue, blue, and it’ll be the only thing that’s seared into your brain. How incomparable they are. How they’re warm and cold at the same time._

_“Deaky…” he says slowly then, and the raspy drawl of his voice is only amplified by the quietness and the sound-proof quality of the room. “Who knew you’re such a naughty little thing?”_

_John can only blink, his entire body tensing up. He can even feel the skin of his neck heating up, the warmth traveling slowly up to his cheeks, no doubt turning them deep red by now. He doesn’t know what to think—perhaps it’s a habit of Roger’s to accidentally seem like he’s flirting with everyone, and that everything he says sounds like an innuendo. But the way he said that? God, John needs to stop before he makes a real fool out of himself in front of his crush. (Yes, he can finally admit to that.)_

_“Don’t worry.” Roger leans back, thank the heavens. John might just pass out. “If Fred’s pissy about it I’ll be on your side, Deaks.”_

_John smiles at him, focusing on a tiny little mole just beneath Roger’s left eye to distract himself, yet still appearing as if he’s keeping eye contact with the older boy. “I…I hope you will be.”_

_Just when he thought it couldn’t get any worse, Roger sends him a deadly wink._

_Oh no._

_John can feel himself blushing again, alas he turns his attention back to his bass guitar and plucks on the strings gently as if he’s thinking of a new riff, when his insides are feeling like jelly._

☾

 

 

He walks away from Ronnie when her friend Mary shows up with a polite grin, and she thanks him for keeping her company whilst she was away at another room, dancing. John can only bid them farewell, wishing them the best of luck and safety tonight. It’s what Freddie calls the night of celebration, after all, even when the only thing they’re celebrating for is the change of the last digit of a four-digit number set.

 

But he tries to keep himself awake and mainly sober, because Freddie insisted that tonight’s the best excuse for having booze and not feel bad about it. He’s not wrong, but John needs to be ready if he turns out to be the one driving all of them back home. There’s just a bigger chance that that might be the outcome, so he’s a little prepared for it.

 

He walks away from the mini bar and tries to make his way in the midst of the dancing crowd, mumbling little excuse me’s in the hopes of people slightly making some room for him to go. They don’t, so he opts for another technique, which is to Bump Shoulders and Push His Way Through.

 

It works, and now he’s at the kitchen.

 

Now, the kitchen is just a _little_ bit vacant, but he can see a few couples at the corners of the massive room, crowded up against the wall and snogging like their lives depends on it, making John feel like absolute shite.

 

He looks at the island at the centre of the room, the countertop marbled white with some bottles of alcohol on it, along with some stacks of red solo cups. Shrugging, he takes one cup for himself and opens a bottle of rum, pouring just a small amount for his own well-being. Just half of the cup. Maybe less, maybe more. It isn’t quite clear, but he leans against the counter and takes a few sips of it.

 

Not bad.

 

Could be better, though.

 

God, he would never thought that he’d be bored at a _party,_ but here he is, standing alone with a cup in his hand, feeling like the whole thing’s duller than his ex-girlfriend.

 

His friends must be having a ball right now, he thinks to himself.  It’s still hours before the countdown even starts, and he already wants to get himself shit-wrecked, all plans of driving the others home be damned when they chose to abandon him like this.

 

 _Especially_ Freddie, who even said: “Find some new friends, darling! You’ve got it in you, I’m sure of it. There’s a little party animal inside that adorable geek-suit of yours and I’m hopeful that you’ll let yourself go once in a while!”

 

The truth is, there _is_ a part of him that likes to put on his dancing shoes and go out, just live in the moment, but even in occasions like that, there’s a certain amount of liquor that has to be in his system before he walks over to the dance floor and find some bird or bloke to dance with on his platform boots. It’s fun, he gets it, but he’s usually never alone like this.

 

He doesn’t feel lonely, no. Just bored.

 

He decides to walk over to one of the counters and hikes himself up, sitting on top of the marbled surface. Surely the owner of this mansion wouldn’t be mad.

 

He takes another sip of his rum, silently regretting his decision to come here in the first place when he could be at home, finishing his amp.

 

 

 ☾

 

_The morning is quiet, but it’s the pleasing kind of quiet that John particularly likes. The only sound is coming from Freddie’s radio, set in a low volume, playing some jazz song that John can’t recognise. The windows are all opened, letting the morning breeze just comes right into Freddie and Roger’s flat like it meant to be._

_John flips over the omelette on his skillet, grinning to himself when he did it just right, feeling a little thrill over the fact that maybe, just maybe, he’ll be a chef. It’s a life-long dream of his, even when he’s currently studying mechanical engineering. What can he say, he believes in destiny. And he’s sure he’s destined to be a chef, even when the only things he can make are omelettes and pancakes._

_John swings his hips a little to the beat of the song, gently, just letting himself calm down at this time of the day._

_Suddenly, Brian comes into the kitchen wearing only a robe that John recognises as Freddie’s, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand as he yawns. When he drops his arm, his robe becomes askew and  falls down his shoulder, revealing his collarbone and the abundance of purple bruises littering the skin._

_John feels his cheeks heating up at the possibilites. Why is he here? And why is he wearing Fred’s robe?_

_“Bri?” John asks, lowering the heat of the stove just a little. “Why are you here?” He turns his head to face the older boy._

_Brian only looks up at him, his eyes still bleary as he takes a seat right next to Freddie. The latter only sends a saucy little smile at John’s way, and takes his cigarette out of his mouth before he turns his head to plant a little kiss on Brian’s cheek. Oh._

_That’s a bit unexpected._

_Brian flushes deeply at this, his fair skin turning bright scarlet. Freddie only pats his cheek gently, running a hand down Brian’s dark curls as he says next to the younger’s ear, “Say good morning to John, my dear.”_

_“Ah,” John says, biting down a smile. It’s nothing extraordinary to see his band members act upon their needs, but to actually see that it’s happening between the band members itself, it baffles John just a little bit._

_“Good, um, good morning, Deaky,” Brian says with a small chuckle, sending him a rather awkward wave in which he returns._

_“Hi,” he replies._

_The moment he says that, Roger comes into the room, his blond hair disheveled and his neck littered with bruises that immediately makes John turn to ignore the sinking feeling in his chest. Even Roger dressed in a simple t-shirt tucked into some pyjama pants look charming, John doesn’t know how he does it, really._

_Or perhaps John’s just too weak._

_“Heaven’s sake, Rog, you ruined my bloody night,” Brian says, rubbing at his cheek with his fingers. There’s a rather frustrated tone behind his voice. “Ask your partner to tone it down a bit next time, please.”_

_Freddie barks out a laugh as he throws his head back. “Oh, definitely,” he says, before turning his attention back to John. “Deaky, I wish you were here last night to share our desires to jump off the window. It was just absolutely…atrocious.”_

_“What happened?” John asks out of pure curiosity. He turns off the stove, now that his omelette is done. Perfect._

_Freddie narrows his eyes. “Oh, I’ll tell you what happened,” he says, before he closes his eyes and makes the pitch of his voice higher as he screams rather dramatically,  “Roger! Harder, Roger! Oh my!”_

_John feels himself wanting to be swallowed by the earth whole, cheeks ablaze. God, the thoughts that come surging into his mind—he needs to throw them all away at once._

_Roger throws a piece of bread at Freddie’s head, which lands safely on top of his hair. Freddie rolls his eyes at it, before he picks it up and takes a bite out of it._

_“I told you, don’t bring a bloody bird when Brian’s here, Roger darling,” Freddie sighs, taking a sip of his coffee, as calm as ever._

_“Oh, it wasn’t a bird, Fred,” Roger says casually, startling John to the point where he accidentally drops his spatula. He turns his head to face the blond, only to find Roger already looking at him with his eyebrow raised and a small smile playing on his lips. John turns his attention back onto his omelette, and then he transfers it onto a small plate._

_“Oh, really?” Freddie asks, furrowing his eyebrows as surprise covers the tone of his question. “I really thought—“_

_“Voice was really high pitched, wasn’t it?” Roger asks in return, nicking a cigarette from Freddie’s pack and lights it up, ignoring the older boy’s aghast yelp._

_“You shag blokes now?” Freddie asks._

_“No, well, yeah,”  Roger replies, blowing off the smoke into the air. “ Thought you’d know that I’m bisexual, Fred. I fuck whoever. Whatever. Who even gives a shit when you’re havin’ a good time?”_

_“Cheers to that, love,” Freddie lifts his coffee cup in a mock toast, smiling widely up at Roger whilst Brian shakes his head and hides his chuckle behind his hand._

_John’s heart just skipped a beat._

 

 ☾

 

 

 

Okay, he lied.

 

He feels lonely, and the more he takes a sip of his receding rum the lonelier he feels. The more he slips away the more he thinks about Roger, how pretty Roger’s… _everything_ is, how charming and kind and welcoming he is to everyone, how funny he is, and how much John wants him. God, he’s slowly losing his mind.

 

You can count on John Deacon to feel heartbroken and alone on New Year’s Eve.

 

The more he thinks about it, he’s wasting his time. With Roger, with this party, just moping about like a pathetic dog. He should be having fun, dancing and talking to people, laughing and just genuinely having a blast. There’s so much to life and to this evening than just a full-blown avalanche of melancholy, isn’t it? And the alcohol thrumming in his veins just make him even more awake than ever, like he needs to act up on it.

 

He downs his rum in one go and throws it to the nearest bin because remember (!), don’t litter. That’s just common decency.

 

He walks over to another room, where the music is blasting loudly from the speakers and the crowd is actually _going,_ like it’s the last night of their lives. They’re dancing to themselves, with each other, _on_ each other, all up against one another in a way that makes John’s heartbeat go just a little bit faster.

 

He can feel the beat of the music on his feet, and he lifts his chin up, trying to forget the world around him and focus on himself for once. He’s here tonight, and if he spends it drinking and thinking about someone who had no chance of wanting him in any way, he’s wasting his time, he truly is. The night’s still young.

 

The music is some bass-heavy track that John doesn’t really know the name of, but he has heard of it once before. It sets off a really nice tempo, a kind that isn’t too fast yet not so slow. It’s stable, and sexy in a way, almost. John shakes his head and walks over to the dance floor, closing his eyes and swaying his hips a little bit in order to forget that he _is_ dancing alone and he _is_ a little bit buzzed but it’s what he should’ve been doing this whole evening!

 

Not a moment later he feels another person in front of him, their hands on his shoulders, and he leans a bit over to them, almost losing his balance because of how lost he is. When he flutters his eyes open, he sees a girl, with short dark brown hair and pretty, dazzling eyes.

 

She’s smiling up at him, her heavy eyelashes fluttering almost like fans. Her lips are ruby red under the dim light, and they just look far too enticing in his little blurred mind, but he holds himself back. She raises her eyebrows as she drags him a little closer, as if she’s asking for permission, and John just nods.

 

She presses himself closer to him, circling her arms around his neck before briefly pulling his hands over to her waist, where he places them there with no hesitation. He feels her leaning over to whisper something in his ear, something along the lines of ‘Anita.’

 

Perhaps that’s her name.

 

He’s dizzy, and the proximity surely doesn’t help. He just smiles to himself and lets himself be, pressing his hips against the girl’s boldly that even surprises himself. She lets out a little ‘oh!’ before chuckling and swaying her body against his in unison. He grabs her hand and spins her a little, being careful of his own steps as well because of his platforms. She laughs, throwing her head back before she’s returned back in his arms, her chin resting on his shoulders, her hand cradling the back of his neck.

 

“You’re a good dancer,” she says.

 

John nods with a hazy smile, the praise just seeping right into his blood, warm and airy. “Thank you.”

 

“My friends wants to dance with you,” she says, a hint of a laugh on her voice.

 

“Hm?” John only asks, throwing some strands of his hair over his shoulder when he feels it covering his neck in a rather uncomfortable way. He feels Anita twirling some of his hair, before letting it go.

 

“You’re pretty,” she says with a pout, and John bites down a smile—god it seems to him that praises just feel like the loveliest things to hear, “I wish I could spend more time with you.” She pauses before she spins around somewhere and another person takes her place, with their hands placed upon his shoulder once again.

 

John opens his eyes in surprise, and this time he’s staring into a green pair of eyes that belongs to another stranger. Male. He’s slightly taller than John, proven by the fact that John has to tilt his head up a little to look into his eyes. The boy sends him a brief, coy smile that somehow looks to sweet to John’s slightly-inebriated mind before he asks, “Hope you don’t mind.”

 

John shakes his head, a woozy smile playing on his lips because he’s _actually_ having this.

 

Feeling a little bold, John smiles when he grabs both of the boy’s hands to put them on his hips, feeling a little light-hearted when he sees the boy briefly looking down shyly, a supposed mirror of what John should be acting. John turns his body and backs himself up towards the boy, until his back hits the boy’s chest with a light _thud._ John bites his own lip a little, feeling a bit surprised at himself at his own sudden courage.

 

He feels the boy’s grip on his hips tighten a little bit, and John instinctively leans his head back against the boy’s shoulder. When he turns his head to the side, he lets out a shaky breath against the boy’s shoulder.

 

He sways his hips, because that’s the only thing he knows to do right now.

 

“Alright?” John asks, feeling himself blushing even under the influence.

 

The boy only chuckles. “You’re a good dancer,” the boy says. “I wasn’t brave enough to ask you, that’s why I asked for Anita’s help.”

 

John hums in response. He doesn’t know what to think about the things going on around him. Somehow his mind is blank, and he wants to feel _something_.

 

“Hope you don’t mind,” he says.

 

John just smiles. “Not at all.”

 

With that, John breathes out and reaches a hand up to trail the end of his finger down the boy’s neck, before he drops it and forgets about the world for a minute.

 

 

 

 ☾

 

 

 

_“Coffee?” Roger asks him one day, out of nowhere when John is sitting on the sofa at the studio, a thick book on his lap._

_John looks up, widening his eyes a little in surprise when his eyes meet Roger’s blue pair in an immediate reaction. He just can never get used to it. Roger then raises an eyebrow at him, waiting for a response, and John nods his head, just a little across the point of frantic._

_Roger sends him a smile, before nodding and walking over to another point of the room where John knows Freddie has kept a coffee machine at. Sometimes he silently thanks Freddie because of his marvel_ _ous choice, because John finds great comfort in reading at the studio when they’re finished practising, the quietness and the calming ambiance just helping his comprehension._

_“What are you reading, Deaks?” Roger asks, and John shifts a bit on his seat, biting down slightly on his bottom lip to hold back a small smile. Good god, he just can’t understand himself sometimes. How much of a little star-struck schoolboy are you to be_ this _crazed and easily-flustered?_

_“Uh…” John turns the book over. “It’s just a book about the basics of sound balancing.” He shrugs, even though Roger can’t see him from the way he’s standing. “Thought I could do more help in the studio when we’re mixing tracks.”_

_“I thought you already helped us in mixing already?” Roger says, the tone of his voice suggesting a question._

_“I do,” he replies. “Just thought that maybe I could add more effects with, um, bouncing the sounds. It’ll add a more dynamic kind of feel to it, I think.” He shrugs. “I don’t know, really. It’s just something that I’ve got on my mind.”_

_Roger lets out a chuckle. “Everything you’re got in that head of yours just seem to always turn everything we make into bloody masterpieces.”_

_John smiles, feeling heat on his cheeks. “Roger…” he warns playfully. “Modesty.”_

_“I don’t have any, darling,” Roger replies._

_John immediately tenses up, his hand gripping on the edge of his hardcover book involuntarily in surprise. Surely Roger doesn’t mean it any way, and John is simply being absolutely ridiculous._

_“You—you sound like Fred,” John says, swallowing down a bit before he silently curses at how he stuttered._

_“I do live with him, you know.”_

_John just flips over a page, and suddenly the pictures on the yellowing paper seem like absolute rubbish that he can’t understand._

_Just when he thought it wouldn’t get any worse, Roger sits down next to him on the couch, which immediately prompts John to scoot a little towards the side of the couch, away from Roger. When he looks up, he sees that Roger is lifting up the cup of coffee towards John. He nods to express his gratitude and closes his book before he places it on a little table next to him. Taking the cup from Roger’s hand seems like such a task to do, and when he actually does, he feels his fingers slightly brush against Roger’s and it should_ not _send a tiny shiver down his spine._

_Fuck, he’s being such a child._

_“Thank you,” John whispers, taking the cup himself in the hopes of turning it into a distraction. Roger nods._

_John is blowing on his drink when he hears Roger says: “Y’know, Deaks, I think I know we’re gonna be something. I had that feeling when we got you.”_

_John pauses, before turning his head to face the elder._

_“I’m serious, John,” he says calmly. His voice is kept at such a leveled tone that John can’t help but to listen to every single word he’s saying. “I really do mean it.”_

_John sends him a smile._

_Roger’s gaze never falters, and it makes John feel like he can’t move a muscle. “Believe me when I say that you are the best bloody thing that’s ever happened to this band.”_

_“I can’t believe that,” John croaks out. “You can’t expect me to, Rog.”_

_Roger’s eyes go ridiculously soft at that moment, almost like waves crashing into the sand, whatever that is. John’s mind is a mess. He hopes the coffee hasn’t gone cold now that he’s leaving it be._

_“Why?” he asks. “Why can’t you believe that, John?”_

_“Because…” John stutters. “Because you’re making me look like I’m so—I’m so much more amazing than I actually am.”_

_Roger rolls his eyes, before he takes John’s glass from his lifeless hands and puts it on the ground next to their feet. John only looks down at his empty hands, furrowing his eyebrows as if he doesn’t recall how the glass has suddenly disappeared._

_He almost has a heart attack when Roger suddenly takes his hands in his, clutching on them like it’s nothing, and all John can do is widen his eyes and look down at how Roger’s hands engulf his own. It’s all too warm._

_Far too warm._

_“When will you ever believe that you’re so much more than you think you are, Deaky?” he asks, his voice just far too frail and too light to be Roger Taylor’s._

_John shakes his head. “I know my worth, I do,” John replies. “And I don’t want you to think I don’t know that.”_

_Roger keeps on looking at him, and as hypnotising as it is, he needs to say his mind._

_“But I don’t want you to forget, ever,” John says, “that we are all the things that make this…band whole. It’s all we have.” He smiles for a moment, and he feels flying, almost. “I’m just an engineer with a bass guitar, Rog.”_

_Roger smiles. “Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, I know.”_

 

☾

 

 

When John opens his eyes, he sees that the lights have turned from purple to red. It isn’t the kind of deep red that engulfs the entire place into an overwhelming kind of feeling like a gay bar does, but it’s simply… _red_ , coating them all in a seductive kind of glow.

 

John turns his head, seeing that the boy has tucked his chin near a spot on John’s head.

 

“Do you mind if I go?” John asks.

 

The boy straightens up a little, before he lets go of John’s hips and shrugs. “Of course not,” he replies with a soft smile when John turns to face him. He’s really lovely, with cheeks littered with faint freckles and eyelashes darker than a woman’s with mascara. Or maybe he’s also wearing mascara, he doesn’t know. His eyes are still so brightly green, that it’s sure John can never miss it.

 

“Ta,” John says with a smile. “I had a really good time.”

 

The boy nods his head. “You know, I’ve never got your name.”

 

“It’s John,” he says.

 

“Nice to meet you, John,” the boy says. “I’m Paul. Paul McCartney.”

 

John sends him a wave, before he walks away, entering another room in the process.

 

This one is coated in turquoise, and he feels a bit like he’s underwater. It’s such an odd feeling, but the music is calmer here, allowing people to chat more freely. The more he walks from one room to another, the more he feels like he’s dreaming, and this mansion is just all of his pent up emotions in the form of a house with labyrinths and party lights and alcohol. The only thing to resolve it all.

 

As he’s looking around the room, he hears a voice calls out for him: “Deaky!”

 

When he turns his head, he sees Freddie sitting on the floor with about three people in an odd circle, with a Scrabble board laid out in the centre. He’s waving at him, John realises, before he returns it, just…less exuberantly.

 

“Are you playing Scrabble, Fred?” he asks. Freddie beckons him closer with his hand and John moves over to him, sitting next to him. He sees Freddie tracing a hand over his letters, the corner of his lips curled up in contemplation. John takes some of the letters and rearranges it on the letter stand, to form the word  Hubris. Freddie then lights up and claps his hands, as if he hasn’t realised that possibility yet.

 

“Ta!” he says with a massive grin, before placing the letters down on the board, right across the word Ether. “Where have you been, dear?”

 

John chuckles to himself. “Just…dancing.”

 

Freddie turns to him with a gasp and cups his face with his hands, squishing John’s cheeks together. “Attaboy!” he says. He releases John’s face, leaving the latter exhaling. “See, what did I tell you?”

 

“I’m only willing to dance when I’m with you guys,” John admits.

 

“Aww,” Freddie coos, before taking some more letters from the bag and places them carefully on his stand. “Aren’t you just so _sweet_?”

 

“Oh, sod off.” John huffs out.

 

“Where’s Bri and Rog?” Freddie asks him, his eyes trained on his cream-coloured letter squares. John shrugs.

 

“Don’t know,” he replies with  a pout.

 

“Poor thing.” Freddie turns to him, his eyebrows a bit furrowed. “You’re not planned on getting shit-wrecked, are you, dear?”

 

John just smiles at him, and Freddie shakes his head.

 

“I’m going to need you to drive us all home, Deaky,” he says. “But it’s alright. Have all the fun in the world tonight if you want.”

 

Freddie rubs the tip of his finger against his lip for a brief second before he raises his eyebrows, picks up three letters, and places it on the mat. Blue, it says to the side.

  
“Bloody brilliant,” Freddie mutters to himself, before lifting a slim glass of champagne and downing it in one go.

 

 

 

☾

 

 

 

_John jumps a little on his seat when he feels another person sits down right next to him on the piano bench, eventually forcing him to scoot over to let the other person have some space. John’s fingers stills over the ivory keys when he smells the cologne of the person next to him, fair strands of blond hair gleaming when the sun streams right through them almost seamlessly. He doesn’t even have to turn, John knows who it is._

 

Please don’t leave.

 

_“What’re you up to, Deaks?”_

 

_There it is, a corner of John’s mind tells him that he’s coming for him, and just for him. But another tells him that he’s being friendly and John’s being ridiculous._

 

_“I don’t know,” John says with a shrug, slowly gathering the courage to turn his head and face their drummer._

 

_Which is a mistake._

 

_Roger’s actually far closer to him than he thought he was, and when he looks into the elder’s eyes, there’s right there looking right at him, bright blue and hypnotising in a way that no other person can replicate. The charm is rightfully Roger Meddows Taylor’s own, and John’s one fallen victim for it._

 

_John feels his own breath hitching._

 

_“I’m, uh,” John scoots a little to the left, to leave more space between the two of them because he really can’t handle proximity. Especially when it’s with him. That cursed ‘h’ word. Him. “I’m just...I thought I’ve got an idea for a song. Nothing much, though.”_

 

_Roger looks at the piano in front of him. “Play it for me, then,” he says quietly. “I want to hear it.”_

 

 _John blinks rather dumbly, before he looks down at his fingers over the piano keys, and he suddenly feels a bit lost. Like those fingers on the instrument aren’t really his own for a second. And then he blinks, again, before he takes a small breath just to clear up the beating of his heart against his chest that is oh-so-distracting to his own wellbeing._ I’ve got it _, he thinks. This song, he’s been working on it and Roger wants to hear it, so the only thing John is going to do is play the melody that he’s got on his mind that his vocal abilities can’t give._

 

_He starts gently and lets himself go for it, humming the melody that’s already filled with lyrics. He thinks he hums just alright._

 

_He’s got the lyric sheet in front of his eyes, on the stand, and Roger takes it. He just keeps on playing and humming, even though he accidentally skips over a note or two from time to time.  He forgets about them._

 

_It doesn’t take long for him to finish, because the song is quite unfinished as it is. He’s got the main idea of it down, the basic structure of it that he imagines would sound really sweet if it’s sung by Freddie’s voice when it’s a little bit toned down. It’s nothing like a ‘Flick of the Wrist’ kind of that that sounds a bit darker with Freddie’s own voice effects added in, and he has a bit ballad-like tone of Freddie’s voice in his mind when he wrote it._

 

_“Can you do that bit again for me, Deaks?” Roger suddenly asks him, with his lyric sheet in his hand._

 

_“Which one?” John asks, swallowing his nervousness down a bit. This whole thing is getting absolutely ridiculous. Roger is his bandmate, for heaven’s sake, and the last thing he needs to do is be absolutely flustered  whenever they’re left together because if they’re lucky enough, this could be happening again for many times in the future._

 

_And John really hopes for that._

 

 _“I want to hear how this part goes,” Roger says as he scoots over to John a little bit closer, and this makes his eyes go wide for a moment when he realises that he can’t really get away from Roger if he does’t want to fall off the seat. Roger brings the sheet closer to him and points to the lyric_ ‘Oh, you make me live.’

 

_John turns over to settle his fingers down onto the keys and bites his lip a little, before he turns to Roger for a second, seeing the other staring at his...chin? with a rather pointed look on his face before he looks up right into his eyes. John flushes, turning his head towards the piano again. How, how, how would it sound like again? John thinks to himself, before a corner of his mind rescues him from this daunting situation of ridiculing the hell out of himself because his – don’t judge – crush is sitting right next to him._

 

_John lets his fingers dance over the five chords that sounds like how the melody would go._

 

_He turns back to the blond again, seeing him nod his head._

 

_And then he starts to sing._

 

_John can only hold his breath. It represents what he has in his mind quite nicely,  and now that he hears it, he’s sure of what it would sound like when their lead singer sings it._

 

_Roger lifts up a brow. “That’s how it goes, yeah?” he asks, and John can only nod. “That sounds lovely, John.”_

 

_John instinctively ducks his head, trying to hide his obviously reddening face behind his hair. “Thank you.”_

 

 _“You’re welcome,” Roger says. A moment passes between them because frankly, John doesn’t know what to do or what to say anymore. Being with Roger turns his mind into a_ _halt, and he doesn’t know what to think of that. He hates himself for it, but it’s what has happened and there’s no way he’ll be able to get away from this except when time forces him away from it._

 

_John feels himself letting out a breath._

 

 _And then he feels a finger near his face, lifting the part of his hair that covers the side of his face entirely. The touch is so gentle that it takes a few seconds for him to notice that it’s there, eyes faltering all over the place in an attempt to access the situation that has so cruelly bestowed upon him. And then he feels the hair being tucked behind his e_ _ar. And then he feels the finger down the side of his jaw. Just under his ear, near his neck. Touch just a little further on his neck and John would die._

 

_Christ._

 

_John wants to pass out._

 

 _He slowly turns his head, and it’s so, so difficult when he knows that he’ll see Roger’s face next to him. And it’s hard for him because he knows what Roger did, and god, this feels like a dream. Except that it’s not, this is_ real _, and this is making John feel like he’s going to burst. His mind is a jumbled mess, full of confusion and surprise and sheer thrill and his heart is beating so fast and so loud that he fears Roger might hear them in this quiet studio._

 

_He’s right. He sees Roger, and his eyes on him, and it makes his breath hitch in his throat._

 

_The spell suddenly breaks, and Roger blinks away. John turns his head towards the piano._

 

_“Sorry,” he hears Roger say after he clears his throat. “Don’t know what came over me.”_

 

_John doesn’t answer._

 

_Roger stands up, leaving the lyric sheet on the stand before he briefly leans against the piano, a small smile plastered on his lips as if he didn’t just send John into cardiac arrest._

 

_“It’s really lovely, Deaky,” Roger says, his voice an odd quiet tone that floats in this quiet studio. “Is it for someone?”_

 

_John bites his lip. “I don’t know yet,” he replies, looking at the edge of the piano instead of the man standing._

 

_“What’s the title?” the blond asks him._

 

_“’You’re My Best Friend,’” John replies._

 

_Roger smiles. “Whoever that ‘you’ is,” he says. “They should consider themself a lucky bastard.”_

 

_John stills._

 

_Roger taps the piano twice before he walks away, leaving John in a flurry of confusion and heart palpitations that send his mind reeling with no direction whatsoever._

 

_He can’t believe it._

 

_He’s really dying because of Roger Taylor._

 

☾ 

 

“Deaky darling, help me out on this one.” Freddie nudges his side, and John jumps a little on his seat.

 

You can rely on Freddie to take him out of his useless train of thoughts.

 

John feels something poke his side, and he turns his head to see a girl with a bob haircut quirking an eyebrow at him, a bottle of beer on her hands, as she lifts up an empty cup for him to take. He shrugs, taking it and looking as the girl screws the bottle open and starts to pour the liquid down his cup slowly. She’s rather pretty even under this lighting.

 

“Thank you,” he says. She smiles at him, tight-lipped.

 

He brings the cup up to his lips and takes a little sip, testing a little on how it tastes. There’s no way in messing up beer, but he has drunk some of them that tasted like cat piss. This one is certainly mediocre at best. He can deal with that.

 

John looks over to Freddie’s new collection of letters, and in his slightly hazy mind, he rearranges them in his head and tries to make out every possibilities there are. It takes a few moments for him to do, but he finds one that he supposes will satisfy Freddie just fine. He points a finger towards the older man’s letter stand and points at the letters that would make the word ‘Pout.’

 

Freddie beams, before he downs his drink once more and places Pout across Home.

 

“You’re just brilliant!” Freddie says to him with a smile, leaning sideways to rest his head upon John’s shoulder.

 

“Thanks, Fred,” he replies, before taking another sip and lets his eyelids droop down for a few seconds. He convinces himself that  he’s not tired; it’s only nine, for heaven’s sake. Just three more hours and he can rest his feet upon his new bedsheets. The suede platforms that he loves so much – as lovely as they are – bring pain upon the very existence of his feet when they’ve been worn for at least five or six hours.

 

Usually when they’re on stage, which is one of the many occasions that require him to wear those for five to six hours, the adrenaline makes up for the pain, and even so, he feels confident and pretty in them.

 

But you’ll never catch him saying that to anyone.

 

“Are you knackered already?” Freddie says next to him, and he blinks his eyes awake.

 

“No,” he replies, shaking his head just slightly. “Well, not quite.”

 

He feels Freddie’s hand on the top of his head, patting and rubbing on it gently before letting it go. “Poor dear,” he says. “Just go out and dance some more if you’re bored, Deaky.”

 

“My feet hurt,” John says. “I’d dance again when they’re all fine again. It’ll probably take a minute, I’ll recover real fast.”

 

“Good to hear.” Freddie laughs. “It’s pleasing knowing that you’re deeply committed to your fashion, John darling.”

 

John just shrugs. “Haven’t got anything else to be deeply committed to otherwise.”

 

“Don’t talk like that,” Freddie says. “You sound like Bri. Which reminds me—where is that broccoli?”

 

John succumbs to his tiny fatigue, and eventually rests his head upon Freddie’s, sighing gently. “No idea,” he replies. “Probably talking in the other room to someone about his bloody clogs.”

 

Freddie hits his arm, but John can feel his shoulders shaking from the way he’s chuckling. One of Freddie’s hand moves to pick up some letters and he places them on the board.

 

“Be gentle with our Bri, dear,” Freddie says. “There’s nothing wrong with a person’s taste.”

 

“Or rather the lack thereof—”

 

“John Richard Deacon!” Freddie smacks his arm again, even though the next thing he does is circle his arm around John’s own. “I’ll tell that poor boy all about this. I bet my left leg he’ll throw his beloved vegetables at your face, and I’ll be the only spectacle, I’ll have you know.”

 

"You're just on his side 'cause you're into him," John remarks, crossing his arms together in front of his chest. 

 

Freddie presses the tip of his index finger against his forehead and pokes him as he lets out a chuckle. "Shut it."

 

John shrugs, closing his eyes as the alcohol in his system slowly spreads in just the slightest, sweetest way.

 

 

☾

 

 

_“Roger?” John knocks on the door to the studio and feels hesitation in his body when he hears no response. Brian said that Roger spent all day in the studio to work on some tracks that he’d like to develop all by himself first. It doesn’t seem concerning at the beginning, but it rustles John’s feathers when he actually doesn’t hear anything from the studio._

 

_Not even a random strum of a guitar. Not even a twinkling sound of a cymbal that Roger has the habit of making by tapping on the golden disk lightly when he finds himself with nothing to do in there._

 

 _“_ _Rog?” John calls for him again. Nothing. “Rog, it’s John.”_

 

_Furrowing his eyebrows, John just opens the door and feels his jaw drop when he sees Roger sitting on the piano bench all by himself, his head propped up by his hands which elbows have been so oddly placed above the keys. There’s an cup of something on the piano, only halfway empty._

 

_When he sees an empty bottle lying on the floor next to his feet, John runs. John runs for him, grabbing him by his shoulders and trying to make the drummer sit upright. Roger’s body goes pliant, he looks like he’s got nothing left._

 

_John feels his heart racing, no, no, no no no._

 

_“Rog?” John calls for him, biting down on his lips when he hears how weak his voice sounds. “Roger, what’s happened to you?”_

 

_Roger head lolls back, and he’s staring at him. His blue eyes are absolutely empty, dull, cloudy. The twinkle is no longer there. He then blinks, his heavy eyelids falling over weakly before they open once more, revealing those eyes that John almost can’t recognise now._

 

_“Deaky?” Roger asks, his eyebrows slowly furrowing._

 

_With a whimper, John brings Roger into a hug as he sits right next to the man on the piano bench, not caring at all even when it’s cramped. Roger feels cold. He doesn’t look like he’s sickly but he’s cold, cold, cold._

 

_John buries his face in the crook of Roger’s neck, his heart racing because dear god, what has Roger done to himself?_

 

_“Roger, are you alright?” he asks frantically. “Please, please talk to me.”_

 

_He feels the corners of his eyes stinging, and god, he’s going to cry but he doesn’t care. He doesn’t care when he feels the tears streaming down his cheeks, tasting salt on his tongue. His mind is only filled by how Roger is completely unresponsive against him._

 

_“Roger, what have you done?” His voice breaks at the end, and he sniffles. He feels pathetic, but fuck, his heart aches._

 

 _“John...” Roger’s voice is scratchy next to his ear, and John lets out  a breath of relief when he feels Roger’s arms slowly come up to wrap themselves around John’s body in_ _return. “Deaky, why are you here?”_

 

_“I was worried sick!” John wraps his arm s a little tighter. “I was wondering why the studio was so quiet and...and, and the others were out so I was.. I just wanted to know how you were doing...”_

 

_“Oh.” Roger brings his hand up to rest against the back of John’s neck. The touch is searing against his skin but John shakes the thought of his head. He doesn’t need any of that now. “I’m sorry, John, I really am.”_

 

_John pulls away, but he grabs Roger’s hand in his and brings them closer. “Why are you sorry?” he asks, with his tearful cheeks and eyes he wishes so desperately for Roger to tell him about what the fuck is going on. “What’s happened, Roger?”_

 

_Roger sighs. “It’s nothing.”_

 

_“Roger, please,” he pleads._

 

_“It’s... Cassie.”_

 

_“Huh?” John doesn’t seem to know a Cassie._

 

_“Cassie,” Roger repeats. “She’s...some girl I’ve been seeing for a while. I really thought she would be the one, you know? For some reason, I always do that... fucking thing.”_

 

_“What happened?” John rubs tiny circles on the back of Roger’s hand. He just notices now how wild Roger looks, especially his blond hair that usually looks gorgeous, now just looks like a hot mess._

 

_It all still doesn’t manage to take away the beauty of Roger Taylor, though. Nothing can ever do that._

 

_“She left me,” he says. “I really loved her, you know?”_

 

_John feels hot with rage. “Why would she even—”_

 

_“Ever since she knew what I am...”_

 

_“What you are?” John asks, tilting his head._

 

_“Bisexual,” Roger replies for him. “Ever since she found out, she thought I wouldbe going around sticking my fucking cock up a bloke’s arse when she was away. I never did, John, never.” His blue eyes go wild when he fixes them on John’s. “I would never hurt her.”_

 

_“You wouldn’t,” John says, pulling him into another hug, feeling his tears drying against the skin of Roger’s neck. “You wouldn’t.”_

 

_“Thank you, Deaky,” Roger says, his hands placing itself on John’s back._

 

_“I’m sorry I wasn’t here earlier, Rog.” John feels himself sniffle._

 

_Roger lets out a little laugh, and it makes John smile a little, too._

 

_“Only you would think like that,” Roger tells him. “You needn’t worry about me at all, John.”_

 

 _“You’re my friend, Roger!” he knows that he’s whining, and he feels terrible because he should’ve been comforting Roger but instead it’s Roger that’s rubbing his back slowly to_ _calm him down. Christ. “Of course I have to worry about you. I really can’t not do that. Hear that? That’s a double negative.”_ _Roger chuckles again, this time a little louder. John feels his heart soar._

 

_“Okay,” the drummer says. “Alright. Worry about me all you want.”_

 

_“Oh, I’m going to worry about you so much—”_

 

_Roger places a hand on top of his, and that’s all it takes to take John’s breath away._

 

_“Thank you, Deaky.”_

 

_“It’s...it’s all fine.” John swallows down. “You know I – we – care about you a lot, right, Rog?”_

 

_“Yeah,” Roger says. “Yeah, I know.”_

 

_John feels himself smile. “Good.”_

 ☾

 

 

John blinks himself awake, finding that Freddie is still playing Scrabbles, and that his arms isn’t circled around his own anymore.

 

God, he really needs some fresh air.

 

“Fred,” he says, before yawning. The vocalist turns his head and raises an eyebrow. “I’m gonna go for a quick bit, alright? I feel all kinds of cramped in here.”

 

Freddie smiles at him, and from that, John knows that he has gotten himself well-inebriated, alright. Freddie’s sharply-lined eyes suddenly look softer, as if they’re languid.

 

“Of course, of course,” he says as his hands makes shooing motions at John’s way. “Go ahead, my dear. I’ll be right here. Playing bloody Scrabble.”

 

John nods at him, before he looks to the side to take his cup along with the bottle of beer left next to it. It takes effort to stand up with his platform boots, but he manages, and soon enough  he’s walking away from the room.

 

It isn’t difficult, because this isn’t as full as the others, and a part of him feels glad for that.

 

John wanders. And wanders. Walking from one corridor to another, stumbling on his way in the midst of lustful couples and drunken friends, in the midst of neon lights and oddly empty halls. The contrast between the vacant and the full is a little too overwhelming, and he finds himself reaching far from it, really. But he keeps on walking, with his red cup as his only fiend.

 

He realises more and more that the mansion is really fucking _massive_. He wonders how big it actually is. When they drove here that evening he didn’t really manage to take up the entire building, as Freddie already ushered them as quickly as possible, uttering things like ‘come on’ and ‘scurry, we’ve got to get pissed as soon as possible, lovies.’ One could never argue with Freddie Mercury, that’s his motto.

Before he knows it, he’s faced with a big flight of stairs where some people are currently residing with their drinks, sitting on the steps. Shrugging to himself, he keeps on walking. And walking until he’s on the god-know-what storey of the mansion. He can’t even imagine actually _living_ here, perhaps a day means another full-on headache trying to get your way around the house. Fancy walking from your bedroom to the kitchen, he’d ask himself. No—would be the answer. He’d rather die in his room from starvation.

As he’s walking, he likes the sound of his heels against the floor. Isn’t it just one of the loveliest sounds in the world? He can never get enough of the sound of the heels of platform shoes against hard floors. They seem to be so melodic.

He finds himself in another corridor, less crowded than the level below him though  still very much similar.

John feels a bit more comfortable here, it makes him feel like he can _breathe_ for a while. He walks over from one hall to another, not caring at all if he’ll be lost in the morning. The mansion is extraordinarily grand, he wonders how long it took to build this all.

If he’s lucky enough, he thinks, he’ll be able to find  small room where he can just rest. Not sleep, but just to ease himself a bit more with his beer.

He halts when he sees a door next to him that he has never seen before in any part of this house. He pushes it open and feels his eyes widen in surprise when he finds himself stumbling upon a balcony. An _empty_ balcony, that is.

 

John walks inside the balcony, feeling a little bit startled when a small gush of wind hits his face, making his hair flow. The balcony itself is quite smaller than what he thought it would be for a house this lavish, but it’s still big enough to be comfortable. The railings are made of cream-coloured stone, and the floor looks like it’s made of stone or ceramics or both. There aren’t anything else on this balcony, perhaps the owner doesn’t even visit this little area quite often, but it’s quaint.

 

He walks over to stand against the railings and looks down, seeing the city unfold before his eyes and the mansion’s massive yard beneath him. There are people there, throwing confetti at each other and spraying water until they’re all laughing and screaming loud enough for him to hear.

 

He leans back against the wall and lets himself fall against him, until he’s sitting on the floor, with his legs outstreched and his hands cupping his beer.

 

This is pleasant. Pleasant enough for him to lean his head back against the wall and close his eyes for a few minutes, perhaps,  before the countdown starts and he can head home.

 

His serenity is suddenly interrupted.

 

John opens his eyes when he hears the door opening. He turns his head, only to see a man with a blond mop of hair peeking his head from the door, and into the balcony that John thought belongs to him for the night. When his face appears a little clearer, John feels his eyes widening at the sight of one Roger Taylor, with a bottle of whiskey in one hand and a confused look on his blue eyes.

 

“Deaky?” Roger asks, furrowing his eyebrows. “What are you doing out here? Shouldn’t you be downstairs?”

 

John shrugs. “It’s not quite my scene.”

 

The drummers walks over next to him near the wall, and sits down right there on the floor. John feels Roger scooting closer until their shoulders touch.

 

Roger has gotten his cheeks sprinkles with golden glitter, the tiny particles reflecting the lights off the city whenever he shifts and moves his head. He’s far too gorgeous for anyone to look at. Roger smiles at him, shaking his head in a way that makes him look like he knows all the secrets of the universe.

 

“Typical,” he replies. “But I know it’s yours. Your scene, I mean. I saw you dancing, you know? At the living room?” Roger sends him a little sly grin, making him turn his head away. “I know it’s your scene, alright. And you belong right in it.”

 

“That’s a big compliment,” John says, swallowing down any kind of hesitation. “Coming from Mr Party himself. Should I be proud?”

 

John feels himself biting down on his lips, holding back a smile.

 

Roger just shrugs and smiles to himself as he turns his head also, facing the sky and the stars spread sparse upon its dark waves. “If you feel like it,” Roger says.

 

“I’m going to put it on my resume,” John remarks, feeling a little bit more at ease as time goes by.

 

Roger chuckles at that. “God, I hope you will.”

 

“Why did you go up here, Rog?” John asks.

 

The drummer just shrugs, placing the bottle of vodka that he has down next to his thighs. “I don’t know,” he replies. “Got bored with the things down there. Walked round and around, hoping to find somewhere empty where I can just drink until I get passed out drunk.”

 

“I hope you won’t do that,” John says. “Brian and Fred would throw a fit.”

 

Roger smiles. “That’s a sight I’d love to see.”

 

“I thought you were already off,” John says, looking down at his thighs and plucking out some stray threads from his trousers. “Off...with some girl, I mean.”

 

“Oh, I was,” Roger says, and John can’t help but to feel the little stab in his chest. He’s supposed to be used to this already; god, he needs to get a grip, he tells himself. “But there’s just this...thing on my mind and I couldn’t bring myself to do it, really.”

 

“Ah.” John nods to himself. “What’s bothering you?”

 

“Someone,” Roger tells him, and this brings the knife the that’s already in John heart a little deeper into his being. A quick shag is fine enough, but a _someone_ , now that’s a sign that what John has been hoping for a whole whopping year is just a borderline unapproachable fantasy by now.

 

“Can’t get them out of your mind, huh?” John asks, cursing to himself when he hears how quiet his voice is. But that’s just how he sounds like most of the time, surely Roger won’t notice.

 

“Yeah,” Roger replies. “I’m not really good at this, you probably noticed, Deaks.”

 

John just smiles. “Who’s the lucky person?”

 

Roger just lets out a little chuckle. “Lucky, my arse,” he replies. “I pity that poor bastard because I fancy that person. Anyone that could’ve been fancied by me are far from lucky. I’m shite.”

 

Roger shakes his head, taking his bottle and downing some of it. John is rendered lost.

 

“Now, don’t you talk like that,” John says. “You’re a wonderful person, Rog, I hope you know that.”

 

“Thanks, Deaky,” he says with a little scoff. “Flattery will get you nowhere.”

 

John frowns. “I mean it,” he says adamantly. “Just... just shut up and accept it.”

 

Roger slumps, letting out a little sigh as he places the bottle back on the cold floor. “Alright.”

 

“That’s better.” John feels the corner of his lips pulling up into a smile.

 

“Thank you.”

 

“No problem at all.”

 

A moment passes.

 

“Deaky?” Roger’s voice cuts through the silence, and John replies with a hum. “Are you seeing anyone lately?”

 

“Why... why would you want to know?” John asks, voice wavering a little because little does the other know that yes, he is seeing someone, and that person is right in next to  him.

 

Roger averts his gaze. “Just curious,” he says, pulling out a pack of cigarettes from his back pocket and taking one of them, before putting it between his lips and lighting it up until the end of it is blazing red. He lets go, and breathes out, blue-grey smoke curling into the air. The sight is something else.

 

“There’s nothing to be curious about,” John says. “At least about me.” He swallows his nervousness, a corner of his mind telling him that Roger would never know. “And to answer your question... I am seeing someone.”

 

Roger turns to him at that, and his eyes are so...so _blue_ that it takes a lot in John to maintain eye contact. Well, not really eye contact, because John looks at the bridge of the elder’s nose to give the illusion that he isn’t slowly losing his composure.

 

“Though I’m just not sure if that someone is seeing me at all,” John admits, feeling himself smiling. What a ridiculous thought.

 

“Why?” Roger asks him, with his eyes still on him in a way that almost makes him nervous. He takes a drag, before letting the smoke out.

 

“I think he doesn’t see me at all,” John says, and he doesn’t even care that he lets the ‘he’ slip out of his tongue. Who cares? What has he got to lose? Absolutely nothing.

 

“Why is that?”

 

Roger doesn’t seem fazed by his slip-out. John is a little glad, but then it falls upon him that Roger is actually bisexual.

 

“I’m not his type, I think,” John says, letting his tongue run along his bottom lip when he feels it drying under the cold weather. He grabs his cup and takes a few sips, hoping it’ll warm him up even a little bit. It’s far too cold.

 

“I think you’re everyone’s type, John,” Roger tells him, and John feels himself grinning this time, his cheeks slowly heating up.

 

“Don’t flatter me,” he says.

 

“I mean it!” Roger retorts back, blowing the smoke into John’s face. “Just shut up and take a bloody compliment, would you?”

 

“Thank you.”

 

“It’s all my pleasure, Deaks.”

 

Time stills just like this, with the two of them on the balcony watching the night sky because they’ve got nothing more to talk about, and frankly, John doesn’t want to talk when this is just as nice. There's something rather pleasing about the way the quietness seeps between them, even if the floors below them are blaring music and laughter and screams, John can only focus on this. On the humming beneath his skin, the beer, the way Roger feels just by sitting next to him.

 

He can hear ABBA right below them, and it makes him want to smile. He wishes he could dance right now, if only his feet aren’t so tired of walking and dancing. He taps the heels of his platform boots just a little against the floor, smiling when he finally hears the sound that he loves. The clicking.

 

“What makes you so fond of those?” Roger suddenly asks him, his head cocked a little towards John's footwear.

 

John raises an eyebrow. “The boots?”

 

Roger nods. “You wear them all the time.”

 

“I...” John looks down at his feet, finding those suede brown pair of shoes staring back at him. “They make me feel more confident, I guess. And...” he trails off.

 

“And?”

 

“They make me feel pretty,” John admits.

 

When he looks up, he finds Roger smiling at him, with that damned cigarette between his rose-like lips.

 

“And you are,” Roger says to him quietly before looking away.

 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” John asks him in return, feeling his eyebrows furrow in confusion.

 

Roger rolls his eyes and parts his lips as he faces him, smoke curling out of his lips. When he returns his gaze to John’s eyes, he feels like he can’t move a muscle “I _mean_ ,” Roger presses as if he’s frustrated with him, “you’re _pretty_ , Deaky. Fucking hell.”

 

John just blinks, at loss of words.

 

“Once again,” Roger says, placing the cigarette back between the grasp of his lips. “Learn to take a compliment because you’re worthy of all of them. I’m sure you know that, you told me once, haven’t you?”

 

Maybe. John can’t remember a thing right now.

 

“Wish you could look at yourself right now,” Roger’s voice cuts through the silence. “Don’t be so speechless when people tell you that you’re pretty, John.”

 

“Why are you...” John feels his voice trailing off, confusion must be drawn all over his face.

 

“Telling you that you’re pretty?”

 

John slowly nods.

 

“’Cause I just feel like it,” Roger tells him, before he looks down at his wristwatch and smiles a little to himself.

 

“Well thank you,” John says, because he can’t think of any other thing to say. He breathes out slowly, trying to calm down his racing heart. It’s only a compliment, and he’ll take

it like he hears it all the time. “What time is it?”

 

“Eleven fifty.”

 

“Time flies,” John says with a chuckle.

 

“It does.”

 

“Eager to go back home?” Roger asks him; John replies with a nod. “Why?”

 

“I’m just tired,” John replies. “Felt a bit bored too, in the evening before I danced.”

 

“You’re a damn terrific dancer, you know that?”

 

John feels himself smiling widely, his cheeks slowly heating up. “Ha,” he says. “Thanks.”

 

“It’s true!” Roger tells him with a kind of enthusiasm that makes him want to laugh. “You know how to move, that’s real admirable.”

 

“ _Thank you_.”

 

Roger turns to him and smiles in a  way that makes his heart skip a beat.

 

 _God,_ John thinks to himself. _I’ve got it bad._  

 

“Not a problem.” Roger pauses.  “But if you wanted to get home so bad, then why didn’t you just do?”

 

“Freddie said I should have fun at least,” he replies. “Because of our last gig. He said I should celebrate. And honestly, I think he’s got a point. So I didn’t.”

 

“Ah,” Roger says with a nod. “I’m glad you didn’t. What’s a party without John Deacon?”

 

John just feels himself smiling, shaking his head. Unbelievable, he thinks.

 

Suddenly they hear a booming sound coming from the bottom level, and that’’s when John notices that the person below is speaking through a megaphone.

 

“It’s five seconds to midnight!” the voice says, followed with a cheering sound of the people around them.  

 

“Would you look at that,” Roger says next to him, both of his eyebrows raised. “It’s five seconds to midnight.”

 

John nods, releasing a huff of breath. “It is.”

 

“You know, Deaks,” says Roger, “there’s something I’d really like to do.”

 

“Hm?” John replies. “And what’s that?”

 

“I don’t know if I’m allowed.”

 

“You don’t know if you don’t try, Rog.”

 

_Five!_

 

“I guess that’s true,” Roger says to him, his voice coming down to almost a whisper. From their distance, it all sounds so, so clear to John’s ear.

 

John just shrugs. “What do you want to do, anyway?” he asks. “From what I know you get away with everything.”

 

“Oh, stop that,” Roger winces.

 

“I’m only joking, Rog.”

 

Roger smiles at him, before he pokes the side of John’s cheek. “I know.”

 

_Four!_

 

“If  I do it, I might ruin this great relationship that I have.”

 

“With who?” John asks him.

 

Roger shrugs, taking one more drag of his cigarette before he stumps it on the floor next to him. “Someone.”

 

“What’ve you got to lose, Rog?”

 

The drummer once again shrugs. “I’ve no idea.”

 

Roger sighs, running a hand over his face, and he sounds like he’s battling with himself over something. What that something is, John doesn’t know.

 

“John?”

 

John turns his head to face him. “Hm?”

 

He sees Roger leaning just a little closer to him, and it startles John to the point he almost jumps on his seat, but he manages to hold himself back.

 

“You look _so_  fucking beautiful,” Roger says slowly, one of his hands on John’s wild hair, the fingers playing with the tresses before he pushes some of them back behind John’s shoulder. John feels his own eyes trailing over Roger’s hand, the way it moves against his hair and his shoulders, and then moving back. Roger’s eyes are burning against his skin, and when he lays his gaze on his lips, he asks: “Can I kiss you, Deaky?”

 

Letting out a shaky breath, John can only nod.

_Three!_

 

He sees Roger blink his heavy eyelids at him, a flutter of thick eyelashes against his fair, though reddening, cheeks. His blue eyes look like fire. Cloudy. Ablaze.

 

Even in his haze, John feels his heart beating wildly in his chest, as if demanding to come out because it just can’t take all of this anymore. This, anything, whatever—it all beats his mind into a pulp and he doesn’t know what’s happening around him anymore and he doesn’t know if he’s imagining things because he accidentally gotten himself to snort cocaine with some strangers or if this is a reality that he has gotten himself into, and frankly, it’s a daunting reality.

 

A corner of his mind reminds him that Roger is probably buzzed out of his mind, just like he is, and he isn’t sure if everything they’re doing and every word they’re saying are just meaningless babble, or maybe they’re all the truth, just repressed before.

 

John doesn’t know what is more terrifying.

 

_Two!_

 

John closes his eyes, letting out a soft breath when he feels Roger’s hand on his cheek, just pulling him closer in a gentle way that even surprises him. He feels all too warm and all too cold, and it messes up with his nerves—it makes him want to do things he can’t even  imagine himself doing and it ruins him.

 

Roger is far too slow. Far too gentle in his touches.

 

John might just think that Roger actually fancies him.

 

But of course, that isn’t possible. Never will be.

 

So John accepts what’s happening right now, where he can feel everything so vividly yet so hazily, where he can feel himself, his skin and Roger’s on him, and it’s all far too much yet he needs more.

 

_One!_

 

And suddenly, they’re kissing. It’s a flurry of time and heavy breathing and confusion, but they’re keep doing it. Roger’s lips move against him in a languid kind of dance, the smallest of touches that make John’s skin buzz and his blood rush. And when one of Roger’s hands places itself on an exposed sliver of John’s waist, he involuntarily gasps in surprise, and Roger seizes the chance to get his tongue in John’s mouth, searching for him, looking for whatever it is, he doesn’t know. 

 

He feels Roger's lips back on his again, nibbling in a way that's gentle yet heart-stopping at the same time. John doesn't know what's happening to him, it's as if the alcohol has amplified each and every one of his senses and nerves up to the highest. He feels like he's hyper-aware of the things that Roger is doing to him, the way his hands touch his body as if he  already knows it better than John does. 

 

John feels his own hands moving in their own accord, burying themselves beneath the silky yet sticky tresses of Roger's hair, courtesy to his decision to douse his hair in a can of hairspray prior to the party. His fingers rake themselves on it, gripping ever-so-slightly whenever Roger takes a bite of his bottom lip in a way that makes him see stars behind the lids of his eyes. He feels Roger's tongue against his lip, almost as if he's tracing a line there across his bottom lip, and in his frenzied mind John realises that Roger is asking for permission. A permission to do something that John would let him indulge in that however he wants. Roger can do anything he wants to him, a wicked corner of his mind supplies, and the thought is all forgotten, all buried, when he parts his lips and feels Roger's velvet-like tongue inside of his mouth once again.

 

John doesn't know a thing. His mind only focuses on the way Roger's nose graze against his, displaying a kind of odd innocence that almost makes him want to laugh. Roger's breath feels hot against his skin, and he feels his own breath being let out, desperate and heavy, as if his heart is trying to tell both himself and Roger that they've got to know. He feels himself shiver involuntarily when he hears Roger groan against his lips, the sound louder in his ears by their proximity, and how the world seems to be so quiet when in reality, it's the loudest it has ever been. He doesn't know a thing.

 

What he know is that the sounds that he’s letting out, he’s not supposed to let them go. John can hear himself in this hazy state, his surprised gasps that are being pulled out of him, the  little moans that sound pathetic.

 

He’s letting himself go, he knows that, but let him be for once, he thinks. He wants Roger to hear him, even if he won’t remember it in the morning.

 

Roger tastes just like whiskey, cigarettes, and a hint of something sweet under all of that.

 

John can’t get enough of it.

 

John’s breath is ragged, and he’s going mad, but dear god, is it mind-blowing. Roger kisses in a way that makes his knees weak and his eyes cloud. He feels like he can’t see a thing, yet he’s seeing everything with his eyes closed. He feels his skin bursting, like the fireworks above. And it shouldn’t feel this good when they’ve got something in their systems but it does—god, it does.

 

When they part, Roger’s hand is burning against his jaw, and John doesn’t want to let go. If this is a fantasy, then let it be, it’s a memory he’ll hold onto until he finds another love, another _somebody_ , that he knows will never compete with his drummer. But of course, don’t we all just want what we can’t have? It’s human nature, and John has fallen right into it.

 

“That’s what I’ve been wanting to do for a long time, you know?” Roger’s voice breaks the air around them. His voice is right there against his lips, and John feels hot all over. Roger’s hand is placed on the back of neck, playing with just the smallest strand of his hair in a way that makes him lose his mind second by second.  “I’ve always thought you were lovely, John. In every way. You’re one of the best people I’ve ever met.”

 

“…You have?” he asks back, heart pounding in his ears.

 

Roger nods, grabbing the neck of his whiskey and drinking it down, gulping it like it’s water. John grabs at the body of the bottle, pulling it away and places it behind him, far from the blond, even when Roger sends him an adorable pout at that.

 

“For a long time,” Roger tells him with a nod.

 

“Oh.” John feels at loss.

 

“Hey, Deaky?” Roger asks, his blue eyes oddly clear when he looks at him. John turns his head. “If...” John sees him bite his bottom lip, averting his gaze for a brief second before returning. “If I say I’d like to take you out, would you let me?”

 

John gulps, looking up at the sky and its floating remnants of flying colours. This can’t be real. Even if it is happening, Roger probably can’t remember a thing in the morning, might as well spill his guts out, hm?

 

“In a heartbeat.”

 

Roger smiles at him, nodding in a way that is so, so lovely.

 

“Good to know.”

 

 

The last firework goes out in a flurry of scarlet blasts that doesn’t seem to faze him anymore. The floors below erupt in wild cheers, and the sound of fake trumpets go off around them.

 

He brushes the tip of his finger against the lip of Roger’s whiskey bottle, trying to collect and remember whatever it is that he can have at the moment, of this proximity, of this kind of odd, inebriated intimacy that John doesn’t understand at all yet seems like he does completely. He’ll keep it to memory, even if they both won’t remember this in the morning, where everything is all like it has always been, the only difference being the change of a single digit in the Year section of the calendar. The feeling of Roger’s lips against his, he’ll keep that to memory. Roger’s hand on his waist. Roger’s legs against his. Roger’s hand on his cheek, his jaw, his neck. His own hands in Roger’s hair, and how soft the blond tresses actually are, far softer than it looks like.

 

How warm Roger really is, that cold demeanour meaning absolute shite.

 

He’ll keep it all to memory.

 

He turns to look at the blond.

 

Only to find Roger with his azure gaze already set on him.

 

John doesn’t know what it means.

 

He closes his eyes and rests his head upon Roger’s shoulder, smiling to himself when he feels the drummer rests his head upon his. John can see some of his blond tresses fall near his face, and somehow he’s alright with that. He doesn’t know a thing right now, but somehow he’s alright with that as well.

 

For now, he feels warm all over, and Roger is warm next to him.

 

And that’s all he needs.

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> yeehaw my tweeter is @deaconism if you'd like 2 holler


End file.
